Garbage smells, mosquitoes invasion, allergies, diseases and then you find this guy cleaning the traffic lights one by one in Down Town Beirut, and the concerned ministries giving us warnings on Twitter.

On another note, here’s what Ziad Abi Chaker, one of Lebanon’s leading garbage entrepreneurs, advises us to do to protect ourselves and our homes:

In regards to the bad smells in Beirut and suburbs, these are due to the removal of the 7 to 8 months old waste which has undergone advanced anaerobic fermentation and has a very putrid smell…we will have to live with this situation until all the old waste by Beirut River and Karantina are removed. There is practically nothing we can do for the smell but we can protect ourselves and homes from the bacteria present in the air:
Get a mouthwash product, if possible select the extra strength, the regular would do too, dilute it 1:1 with water, that’s 1 cup mouthwash to 1 cup water, place the solution in a plastic spray bottle and spray it around your house…Mouthwash has antiseptic properties…if you have little kids spray it twice a day in their bedroom…
There is no need to buy the expensive antiseptics that some companies are pushing on the market now to make a quick buck…The mouthwash solution will be more effective and it should give a nice smell while it lasts…
Hopefully, they will finish removing all the old waste in a timely fashion before it gets too hot as it will become nearly impossible for the handlers to deal with the smells….
On another note, if you or your kids are bitten by the flies, not all are mosquitoes, some of these flies are specific to anaerobic fermentation processes, you can put some mouthwash on a cotton and dab the bite area with it…it will alleviate the burning and automatically cleanse the bite wound from infection….